Photo: Skoda
If you want a good, small car that can carry a lot of stuff in the boot, reach 100 km/h in 7 seconds and also average 7 l/100km, you could do a lot worse than the Fabia vRS, the practical sister of the Polo GTI.
It has the same 1.4-liter Twincharger turbo engine, the same DSG gearbox and is cheaper and more practical. Despite this, the model could get the axe.
Autocar reports that due to slow sales, the next generation of the Fabia won't have a hot hatch version. The information is comes not from Autocar's imagination but from Dr Frank Welsch, Skoda board member for technical development who says people actually like the car for the look and that the Monte Carlo editions with regular engines are doing well, unlike the 180 hp vRS.
Autocar continues to talk about how the trim levels could be changed to reflect this trend, but of course we'd highlight there's another problem with the Fabia vRS. Volkswagen has shown no interest in updating the Twincharger technology that went into Polo GTI because it's complex and expensive. For example, their latest Golf offers a 140 PS 1.4-liter single-turbo engine with cylinder deactivation.
Interestingly, the same engine first went into a semi hot hatchback version of the Polo called the BlueGT. This gets exactly 1 l/100km better city mileage and is cheaper to buy. So maybe Skoda can do something along those lines.
We'd really like to know what Fabia vRS fans and owners have to say about this!
Autocar reports that due to slow sales, the next generation of the Fabia won't have a hot hatch version. The information is comes not from Autocar's imagination but from Dr Frank Welsch, Skoda board member for technical development who says people actually like the car for the look and that the Monte Carlo editions with regular engines are doing well, unlike the 180 hp vRS.
Autocar continues to talk about how the trim levels could be changed to reflect this trend, but of course we'd highlight there's another problem with the Fabia vRS. Volkswagen has shown no interest in updating the Twincharger technology that went into Polo GTI because it's complex and expensive. For example, their latest Golf offers a 140 PS 1.4-liter single-turbo engine with cylinder deactivation.
Interestingly, the same engine first went into a semi hot hatchback version of the Polo called the BlueGT. This gets exactly 1 l/100km better city mileage and is cheaper to buy. So maybe Skoda can do something along those lines.
We'd really like to know what Fabia vRS fans and owners have to say about this!
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